Catholic Acts of Devotion

Both the Portuguese
print of a statue of Christ and a Currier and Ives hand-colored lithograph
depict mysteries of the Catholic religion. One shows a miraculous
statue honored by the pope with a special indulgence and the other
the consecration of the Body and Blood of Christ during Holy Communion.
Both rituals were deeply cherished in Catholic devotion in the 19th
century.

Miraculous Christ
of Ponta Delgada, The Azores by Kristen Rohde

For 19th-century Portuguese-Catholic
immigrants in America, the print of the Miraculous
Christ of Ponta Delgada would proudly reconnect them to a cherished
memory of their homeland. The Convent and Chapel of Our Lady of Hope in
Ponta Delgada houses a statue known as "Senhor Santo Cristo dos Milagres,"
Christ of Miracles. http://www.destinazores.com/festivecelebrations.php
In the past the statue was carried through the streets in time of crisis,
and today it is the focus of a popular religious festival. It is possible
that the owners themselves may have visited the statue or had relatives
or friends who did. The print is not overly large, yet emits a comforting
sense of cultural identity for the owner and would be placed on a wall
in the home for daily reverence.

The Ponta Delgada
uncolored lithograph depicts a nun, the Venerable Theresa of the Annunciation,
engaged in prayer before the statue of Christ of Miracles. Devotion to
the image is endorsed by the Pope by way of 40 days indulgence (limit
once daily) for the recitation of one Our Father, Hail Mary and
Glory Be to the Father, either at the actual site or by meditation
on a reproduced image in the privacy of one's own "sacred space"
of the home.

The idea of an indulgence,
or a way to "work off time in purgatory" by an act or visitation
of a site in order to gain merit, is a practice which dates back to the
Middle Ages. Medieval Christians traveled for miles on pilgrimage roads
to view reliquaries of portions of saints' bodies, miraculous sites or
objects in order to attain the grace of God and allow them passage into
Heaven. Viewing such sacred objects/ spaces was seen as a way of connecting
to the heroic Christian, the saints, who acted as intermediaries between
heaven and earth.

This elaborate sketch
truly captures a miraculous "moment in time" and also aids the
viewer by way of the Portuguese caption describing the event. In the Ponta
Delgada image, Theresa is shown kneeling in front of the Christ image
with open prayer book, rosary and inviting left palm facing up in a loving,
outstretched manner. Christ appears only from the torso up, being shown
as having features belonging to both the King of Heaven and the Suffering
One. His royal cloak and sprays of roses which lay at the base of the
altar cannot deter one's eyes from observing the inhumane crown of thorns
which results in the visible traces of blood leading downward to his neckline.
The nun's awe-inspired trance is never met by the image as he stares blankly
beyond her gaze. This image is meant to engage the viewer in a "moment
in time," "miraculous spiritual happening" and evoke a
sense of internal piety and faith worth meditating on in hopes of obtaining
an indulgence or special favor.

The print came into
existence to honor Christ of Miracles and thereby give people the ability
to bring the sacred site into the home and have it become a permanent
fixture in their everyday lives. To put this in modern terms, we might
say that if the owners of this print had previously visited the site and
then hung this image in their house, this could be described as valuable
"bragging rights" of the time, quite similar to token pictures
of us and our families at the Grand Canyon, Eiffel Tower and other well-known
world landmarks of the present day. This image, which is also a tool to
implement morally sound Christian teaching (by way of prayer and veneration)
and doubles back to forge a sense of cultural pride and identity for the
immigrants' genuine roots.

Images like this were
very important to immigrant communities whose religion and language formed
strong bonds. In the secular world of a modern, homogenized society, finger
paintings of ambitious kindergarten students and copies of Monet's Water
Lilies have often replaced such devout religious depictions. What do they
tell us about cultural bonds and collective memories? Is it now that we
relate primarily to the immediate family or to "art" of pleasant
decoration rather than that of ancestral memory?

The Holy Communion
by Mark McLean

The print of The
Holy Communion depicts a Sunday Roman-Catholic Mass, very similar
to what an Irish immigrant would experience in Worcester of the 1870s.
The church doesn't seem to have much money, which is shown by the small
altar. There is a priest holding the Eucharist while eight men and women
kneel in prayer before the altar. Four altar boys stand behind the priest,
some bowing their heads, others looking to the sky. The men and women
are separated on either side of the altar, men on the left, women on the
right. This division of gender for social and educational purposes has
been evident to us as we looked at schools such as St. Joseph's with its
French inscription "Filles" (girls) and "Garçons"
(boys) in stone letters marking entrances on either side of the building.
The depiction shows the need for expansion not only in the church, but
also in the Irish community as well. Soon they would both grow larger
and the Irish would become a major immigrant group in the United States.

The print was published
by Currier and
Ives in 1873. This was an important time for the Irish immigrants
because during the 1870s the third wave of immigrants from Ireland came
to the United States, and Worcester. The first immigrants came to work
on the canal, and even though the Yankees did not believe that the Irish
would stay in their communities, the Irish had other plans and decided
to start a new life in the United States. The second wave of Irish immigrants
came to the U.S. during the potato famine of 1846 and 1847. Then in the
1870s the third wave of Irish immigrants came and tried to establish a
presence.

Similar to the Miraculous
Christ of Ponta Delgada, The Holy Communion is an image of
multiple copies, a print. The Holy Communion was hand colored whereas
the other print was not. The print seems retains its original frame, and
its discoloration testifies to its long life against the original acidic
wood backing. Although it is slightly smaller than the Portuguese image
it still allows the viewer to get a sense of an Irish Roman-Catholic Mass
and the culture behind it. It is possible that people hung the picture
on the wall and used it as a sense of pride for their culture and religion.

People would want
pictures such as this in their home to bring Church teachings to the house
or to teach good Catholic morals. The image was also used as a sign that
the family followed what the Church believed in. Here the sacrament is
the Eucharist, one of the seven sacraments of the Church (Baptism, Eucharist,
Penance, Confirmation, Holy Orders, Matrimony, and Last Rites). Catholics
were obligated to attend Mass and at least witness the Eucharist every
Sunday. The specific Catholic nature of the sacrament is emphasized by
the Latin words "Hoc Est Enim Corpus Meum" (this is my body),
said by the priest as he consecrates the host. The purchaser of this image
was probably an Irish immigrant who saw the image within a sense of struggle
for all immigrants in trying to have something of their own.

These immigrants were
also trying to develop elaborate churches for themselves, as we have seen
in the Cathedral of St. Paul, downtown, and St. Stephen's on Grafton Hill
with its brilliant stained glass of many saints. Catholics wanted to honor
their beliefs and have them appreciated.

During the 1870's
Irish immigrants were trying to develop a sense of community in a far
away land. Things that aided them in their transition were the rituals
of the Catholic Church. The portrait of The Holy Communion shows
how the Irish put many of these symbols of the Catholic Church in their
home and used them to represent not only the beliefs that the church lived
by but also their struggle as an immigrant group to develop and flourish
in a new country.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Miraculous Christ of Ponta Delgada, The
Azores
Verdadeio Retrato da Imagem do Senhor Santo Christo dos Milagres. / ECCE
HOMO Que se venera no Convento das Religiosas de Nossa Senhora da Esperença
na Cidade de Ponta Delgada de Ilha de San Miguel Açores /Com a
V.Me Thereza da Annunciada orando na Capella do mesmo Senhor O Ex.mo e
R. mo Senr. Nuncio Apostolico Concede 40 dias d'Indulgencia a quem resar
un P.N. A. M. e Gl. Patri/ ou seja diante da propria Imagem ou diante
d'esta Estampa, as quaes so se poderao ganhar uma vez em cada dia
A true picture of the image of the our Lord, the blessed Christ of Miracles,
Behold the Man, that is venerated at the convent of the religious of Our
Lady of Hope in the city of Ponta Delgada in the Island of St. Miguel,
the Azores, with the Venerable Theresa of the Annunciation, praying in
the chapel of the same Lord. His excellency the Papal Nuncio accords 40
days of indulgence for those who recite an Our Father, a Hail
Mary, and a Glory be to the Father, either in front of the
actual image or in front of this print; this (indulgence) can only be
gained once a day.
Publisher: Rep. Lito, Nacional Portugal: brought from Portugal in 19th
century by ancestor of previous owner, Gilly Borges, New Bedford MA
Uncolored lithograph
14 1/2 x 10 1/2 inches (with frame 16 1/2 x 12 1/2 inches)